winter 2005 river report, colorado river project
TRANSCRIPT
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Winter 2005-2006
A project of the Water Education Foundation
COMMON CAUSE:Border Water Issues Unite, Divide U.S., Mexico
Continued on page 4
In This Issue:
Basin Briefspage 3
Calendar of Eventspage 9
Water and environmental concerns
have long existed along the U.S.-Mexico
border, but those concerns may be
growing in an era of increasing supply-
demand pressures, population growth
and regionalization of border economiesin the two countries. Demands on the
western border regions principal water
supply, the Colorado River, are growing
with population and economic develop-
ment, as are demands to preserve at least
part of the rivers historic delta region in
Mexico.
These increasing demands on the
river have brought into sharper focus an
array of water supply and environmental
issues how to supply growing border
areas with irrigation and municipal
water, how to keep fragile riparian
habitat available for endangered species
and how to get binational institutions
and stakeholders to find common causeon solutions to often nettlesome border
issues.
With virtually every drop of Colo-
rado River water allotted to one user or
another, any shift in water allocation in
the border environment, near the rivers
end point at the Gulf of California,
would be acutely felt and would be
controversial. Some see it as a
zero-sum game there is
a finite amount of water to distribute for
various uses, and any efforts to change
the distribution pattern inevitably must
take from supplies already allocated to
one or more existing users. Strategies for
finding solutions include traditionaldiplomatic avenues, voluntary stake-
holder collaborations, private initiatives
and lawsuits. Each approach has its
advocates and doubters.
Some have suggested that the border
is becoming less relevant as the historic
business, social and family relationships
By Glenn Totten
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Dear Readers he Colorado River Project and the Water EducationFoundation lost a good friend with the recent death ofDennis
Underwood. Dennis was frequently quoted in River Reportbecause of his deep knowledge of Colorado River issues and his
willingness to share that knowledge with others. Before he became
chief executive officer of the Metropolitan Water District of
Southern California earlier this year, Dennis was MWDs vice
president for Colorado River Issues, where he was instrumental in
forging consensus among the basin states behind Californias 4.4
Plan. He will be missed by everyone in the Western water world.
Dennis was a regular at the Foundations biennial Colorado RiverSymposium. Next year, the Foundation will publish the edited
Proceedings of the 2005 Symposium. This edited transcript of the
complete Symposium is a great tool for understanding the critical
issues facing the Colorado River Basin. It features the views of top
policy-makers and stakeholders on a range of issues including water
rights, border issues, endangered species, recreation, climate change
and more. The Proceedings book makes a great reference for
understanding the latest viewpoints from Colorado River experts.
River Report is a project of theWater Education Foundation
Colorado River Project Advisory Members
Hamlet Chips Barry, Denver Water
Thomas Graff, Environmental Defense
Herb Guenther, Arizona Department of Water Resources
Gary Hansen, Colorado River Indian Tribes
J. Arturo Herrera, Mexican Section, International Boundary and Water Commission
Pamela Hyde, Wildlands Council
David Lindgren, Downey BrandJames Lochhead, Brownstein Hyatt & Farber
Patricia Mulroy, Southern Nevada Water Authority
Philip Mutz, Upper Colorado River Commission New Mexico
Jerome C. Muys, Attorney
Don Ostler, Upper Colorado River Commission
Lester Snow, California Department of Water Resources
Maureen Stapleton, San D iego County Water Authority
Gary Weatherford, Weatherford & Taaffe
EditorRita Schmidt Sudman
Writer
Glenn Totten
PhotosMike CohenU.S. Bureau of ReclamationRita Schmidt Sudman
MapGraphic Communications
Graphics and Layout
Curt Leipold,
Graphic Communications
The Water Education Foundationthanks all the sources and experts whoreviewed this newsletter for balance
and accuracy.
The mission of the Water EducationFoundation, an impartial, non-profit,organization, is to create a betterunderstanding of water issues and helpresolve water resource problems through
educational programs.
Water Education Foundation717 K Street, Suite 317
Sacramento, CA 95814(916) 444-6240fax (916) 448-7699e-mail: [email protected]
Web page: www.watereducation.org
PresidentHenry J. Vaux Jr. Ph.D.
Executive DirectorRita Schmidt Sudman
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UPPER BASIN :
Global Solution to ColoradoW ater Dispute Under StudyA new study is under way to evaluate apossible global solution to ongoingwater disputes between Colorados ruralWestern Slope and the more urbanFront Range around Denver. The studywill examine the feasibility of buildingan off-stream reservoir near Wolcott,Colo., that could supply water toirrigators who now receive their waterfrom Green Mountain Reservoir. Theproject also would provide water forenvironmental uses of the Eagle River, atributary of the Colorado River, and freeup water in Green Mountain Reservoirfor use by Front Range cities.
Details of the proposal are stillsketchy, but parties hope a plan willemerge that harmonizes the interests ofWestern Slope irrigators with the FrontRanges growing water needs while alsoenhancing habitat for endangered fish.Earlier technical studies concluded thata Wolcott Reservoir could hold between160,000 and 350,000 acre-feet of water,and a 2004 feasibility study looked at
three smaller storage scenarios.Front Range and Western Slope
agencies will share the $200,000 cost of
LOW ER BASIN:
Study Finds Salt CedarManagement Options LimitedOpportunities for managing salt cedar asa way of augmenting water supplies maybe limited, according to a white paperproduced by the Arizona Department of
Water Resources (ADWR). The studycites the presence of endangered species,complex land ownership and variabilityin evapotranspiration (ET) rates asfactors that should be considered beforeundertaking a salt cedar removal oreradication project.
Salt cedar has become established inseveral reaches of the Colorado River,mainly south of Davis Dam. Where it isestablished, salt cedars deep root systems
the new study, which will evaluate cost,water quality and hydrology. In additionto looking at the feasibility of a WolcottReservoir, the study will evaluate re-operation of Green Mountain Reservoir,about 60 miles west of Denver, to allowGrand Valley irrigators, who currentlyreceive about 52,000 acre-feet of waterfrom Green Mountain, to draw theirwater from Wolcott. The switch wouldallow water to be diverted from GreenMountain to the Front Range via theexisting Roberts Tunnel. Water from theproposed Wolcott Reservoir also would
be used to enhance fish habitat in theEagle River.
Results Unclear from GlenCanyon Flow ExperimentsDespite a decade of experiments,scientists are still unsure what effectsdifferent flow regimes from GlenCanyon Dam have on areas below thedam. Several different flow combina-tions have been tried, including simu-lated floods, in efforts to understandhow conditions can be improved for
native species and recreation to moreclosely resemble the rivers naturalflow variations.
are believed to deplete groundwatersupplies and increase soil salinity,making areas crowded with salt cedarinhospitable to less salt-tolerant nativeplants. Projects to eliminate salt cedar byphysical removal have proved costly, and
water quality concerns limit eradicationprojects using chemicals.
The ADWR paper notes that studiesof salt cedar removal projects haveyielded mixed results. A recent studycited in the paper concluded thatincreases in water yield following saltcedar removal were likely to occur onlywhen a salt cedar stand containing highleaf area was replaced by vegetation witha low leaf area. Other studies indicate
In early October, Reclamationcontinued with a series of short-term flowexperiments in an effort to understandthe relationship between dam operationsand dissolved oxygen concentrations inthe river. Low dissolved oxygen levels areharmful to fish. A combination of largeamounts of sediment and organic matterfrom a five-year drought followed byabove-average runoff during the springand summer of 2005 has depleteddissolved oxygen levels below the dam.Researchers are trying to determine if lowreleases spread among varying numbers of
generating units will inject more oxygeninto the water.
During August and September, Recla-mation tried a series of alternating steadyand low fluctuating experimental releasesto evaluate their effects on sedimentmovement and native fish. The experi-ments were recommended by the GlenCanyon Adaptive Management Work Group.
Living Rivers, a group that advocatesdecommissioning Glen Canyon Dam,issued a report in late October conclud-ing that the adaptive management
program has done more studying thanacting to recover endangered species andrebuild habitat in Grand Canyon.
wide variability in ET measurementsfor salt cedar, suggesting that wateryield improvements also could varyafter removal projects.
Opportunities for removal projectsalso are complicated by differing land
ownership and management along keyreaches of the river, the ADWR studyfound. Federal and state agencies, Indiantribes and private land owners controlaccess to land where removal projectsmight occur. In addition, native species,such as the Southwest willow flycatcher(listed as endangered under the federalEndangered Species Act), nest in saltcedar along the west side of TopockMarsh.
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Continued from front page
F E A T U R E
between the U.S. and Mexico grow
closer. The relationship also extendsto water, but as competition for water
increases, will it be an issue that brings
the two countries closer together or
one that divides them?
Were moving from a period of
relative abundance of water on the river
toward a future where were going to
have to work quite a bit harder to meet
the water needs of people as well as the
environment and agriculture in both the
United States and Mexico, says Peter
Culp, project manager and attorney
for programs at the Sonoran Institute.Border water controversies cover
a wide range of environmental and
economic issues, including habitat
preservation and enhancement, water
quality and water to support agricultural
and economic development. In the
past, the U.S. and Mexico might try
to address those issues separately or
through limited
binational programs,
but as border cities
and economies have
grown more interde-pendent, so has the
need to find solutions that satisfy
constituencies on both sides of the
border. A solution to a problem on
one side of the border likely will have
repercussions, sometimes negative,
on the other side.
There have been numerous official
and nongovernmental efforts over many
decades to address border water issues,
but progress has been slow. The decades
of negotiations and hundreds of millions
of dollars spent on wastewater treatmentfacilities to clean up two of the borders
most notoriously polluted rivers, the
Tijuana River near San Diego and the
New River flowing through Mexicali
and Calexico, are examples of the slow
pace of binational efforts to address
common problems. Similarly, it took
15 years for Mexico to repay a 1.5
million acre-feet
water debt September
30 on the other
major binational
border river system,the Rio Grande.
Three current issues relating to the
Colorado River illustrate both the range
of border issues and the different kinds
of forums in which they are addressed.
One example is a recently released white
paper of recommendations for operation
of the Yuma Desalting Plant (YDP)
offered by a collaboration of agencies
and stakeholders as a step toward
addressing environmental problems in
Mexico while also providing assurances
to U.S. water users about their supplies.The collaboration is an example of how
public and private stakeholders can find
common ground where little was
thought to exist.
A second border issue burst on the
scene in July, when a lawsuit was filed
seeking to stop the reconstruction of a
23-mile section of the All-American
Canal. The case raises complex legal
questions about rights to water that
currently seeps out of the unlined canal
and across the border, where it helps
recharge the Mexicali aquifer, and theapplication of U.S. environmental laws.
A third emerging issue is the develop-
ment of shortage guidelines for the
Colorado River system in the U.S. If the
guidelines are adopted, and if a shortage
were declared, how would that affect
Mexico? Under a 1944 water treaty
between the U.S. and Mexico, Mexicos
share of the river could be decreased
in the event of extraordinary drought or
serious accident to the irrigation system
in the United States, but that language
has never been invoked, so it is unclear
how it might interplay with shortage
guidelines.
This issue ofRiver Reportfocuses on
water and environmental issues facing
the U.S. and Mexico in the Colorado
River Basin drainage they share. How
the two countries will cope with the
water challenges they face was the
subject of a panel discussion at the
The Colorado River in the limitrophe section.
The long-term health of
the riparian corridor will
depend on base flows and
pulse flows.
Osvel Hinojosa
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Water Education Foundations Colorado
River Symposium Sept. 28-30 in Santa
Fe, N.M.
BackgroundThe border region affected by theColorado is the area along the California
and Arizona borders with Mexico. The
region includes urbanized areas such
as the Mexicali-Calexico and the San
Diego-Tijuana areas, but also major
agricultural areas such as the Imperial
and Mexicali valleys and important
environmental features along the river
corridor and its delta at the Gulf of
California.
The rapidly growing urban areas
along the border are spawning regionaleconomies that attract population and
new investment. Chris Frahm, an
attorney with H atch & Parent, who
represents water agencies and munici-
palities, noted that Mexico accounts for
$33 billion in trade annually through
the San Diego Customs District. The
San Diego-Tijuana regional economy
is one of the engines driving water
decisions, she said, referring to the
San Diego County Water Authoritys
(SDCWA) transfer agreement with
Imperial Irrigation District that waspart of the Quantification Settlement
Agreement (QSA).
San Diego County is expected to
increase its water use by 118,000 acre-
feet per year by 2020 to keep pace with
a projected population increase to 3.8
million people, said Dan Hentschke,
SDCWA general counsel. By 2020,
Tijuanas population could be the same,
with current water use there projected
to double to 170,000 acre-feet per year,
he said.
A similar pattern is emerging about
150 miles east of San Diego, where the
Mexican city of Mexicali sprawls along
the border south of its much smaller
California counterpart, Calexico.
Mexicali has grown to an estimated
750,000 people in just a few decades,
and will hit 1.2 million by 2020.
These border communities are
centers of economic growth, but they
also are straining available water
resources that serve municipal and
irrigation needs and sustain environ-
mental values on both sides of theborder. The recent drought in the
Colorado River basin is a reminder of
how thinly those resources are stretched,
and no one knows if the drought has
ended yet.
Besides the thriving economy
outlined by Frahm and others, there is
the environment of the Colorado Rivers
riparian corridor and its delta at the
Gulf of California. Once a two-million-
acre wetland ecosystem, the rivers delta
region has shrunk to about 150,000
acres because much of the water that
formerly flowed into it is diverted
upstream in the U.S. and Mexico.
However, the remaining wetlands
still hold significant ecological value,
providing habitat for hundreds of
thousands of migratory birds.
With the development of the
Colorado Rivers water and power
resources has come an influx of popula-
tion and agriculture. Intensively farmed
areas of southeastern California divert
almost 4 million acre-feet of water per
year from the river to grow an astonish-ing variety of crops. South of the border,
Mexicali farmers also use water from the
river and groundwater to cultivate crops.
Efforts to restore the lower Colorado
River in the U.S. and its delta habitat
in Mexico have taken decades to gain
momentum, but activity has quickened
recently on both sides of the border.
State and federal agencies in the U.S.
have recently signed off on a 50-year
Multi Species Conservation Program
(MSCP) to restore more than 8,100
acres of riparian habitat between Hoover
Dam and the U.S.-Mexico border. The
ambitious plan aims to protect six
endangered species, restore cottonwood
and willow habitat, while at the same
time ensuring certainty of existing river
water and power operations (see the
Summer 2005 issue ofRiver Report).
If anything, figuring out what to do
about the delta region in Mexico may be
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River supplies could be cut back, so
some called for operation of the YDP as
an additional source of supply. The idea
was that reducing salinity in the drain
water now discharged to the Cinegawould qualify it to be sent to Mexico as
part of the 1944 treaty obligation, thus
freeing up a corresponding amount of
Colorado River water for use in the U.S.
The 1944 treaty requires the U.S. to
deliver 1.5 million acre-feet per year of
Colorado River water to Mexico.
That idea alarmed environmentalists.
They feared operation of the desalter
would reduce the average 108,000 acre-
feet of water flowing each year from
Wellton-Mohawk drains to the Cinega,
potent ially jeopardizing its marshhabitat. By 2003, positions had hard-
ened into what looked like an intractable
border water conflict.
But in April 2005, an unlikely
collaboration of environmentalists, CAP
officials and state and federal representa-
tives announced agreement on a set of
recommendations under which the YDP
could be operated and the current
bypass flows that sustain the Cinega
replaced by water from other sources.
Culp, who was part of that YDP/
Cinega work group, said the processcould be a model for binational discus-
sions to address other border issues.
A key to the workgroups success,
Culp said, was that members came to
harder than the MSCP because the
potential area for restoration is larger
and there are more institutions that
could be involved. Osvel Hinojosa isdirector of conservation in Sonora for
Pronatura Noroeste, a Mexican nongov-
ernmental entity (NGO) working on
delta restoration. Some of the largest
patches of riparian habitat remaining in
the entire Colorado River basin occur
between Morelos Dam and the mouth
of the river on the Mexican side of the
border, he said.
For the riparian corridor to maintain
ecological health, it must have base flows
of water and periodic, higher pulse flows
to promote natural regeneration ofcottonwoods and willows, Hinojosa said.
The long-term health of the riparian
corridor will depend not only on the
base flows but also on a binational
solution for pulse flows, he said.
Under current operating practices,
what is left of the Colorados historic
delta area is sustained by administrative
losses, water bypassed to Mexico from
U.S. sources, occasional excess flows that
cant be used or stored in U.S. reservoirs
and any water unused by Mexico
(including agricultural return flows).
Such excess flows, or pulse flows, occur
unpredictably about once or twice a
decade, a rate some believe is not
frequent enough to sustain the habitat.
A part of the Mexican Delta, the
Cinega de Santa Clara, has emerged in
recent years as a focal point for restora-
tion. The 12,000-acre marsh is the
largest remaining wetland in the
Colorado River delta region, and is
maintained by saline agricultural
drainage flows from the Wellton-
Mohawk Irrigation and DrainageDistrict across the border in the U.S.
Hinojosa describes the Cinega as a very
important area for birds, supporting
70 percent of the total population of
the Yuma clapper rail, an endangered
bird protected by both countries.
YDP CollaborationThe recent history of the Cinega
during a drought period is instructive
both for what it says about the behavior
of stakeholders and the ability of those
stakeholders to come up with collabora-tive solutions. As the drought deepened
after 2000, water users and suppliers,
notably the Central Arizona Project
(CAP), grew anxious that their Colorado
The deltas largest remaining wetland is the Cinega de Santa Clara.
Border issues panelists (l-r) Chris Frahm (moderator), Bob Snow, Dan Hentschke,
Malissa Hathaway McKeith, Peter Culp, Osvel Hinojosa.
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the table as individuals, not as represen-
tatives of interest groups out to satisfy
narrow, parochial objectives. Over
months of discussions, what he called
the discourse of entitlement gave wayto talks aimed at finding solutions that
would reduce or eliminate the risk of
shortages feared by U.S. water users
while also ensuring the maintenance or
enhancement of environmental values
in the Cinega. Any solution had to
comply with binational water quality
requirements and preserve existing rights
to use Colorado River water.
We all have a stake in producing
enough water for people, and we also
have a stake in making sure that the
Cinega survives, said David S. SidWilson, general manager of the CAP,
who convened the workgroup.
The workgroups recommendations
included a set of short-term measures
such as correcting deficiencies in the
YDP design, establishing a water
shortage contingency fund to mitigate
any water supply disruptions, imple-
menting a monitoring program in the
Cinega to determine the relationship
between water quantity and quality and
maintenance of a healthy ecosystem and
implementing a pilot, voluntaryprogram of consumptive use reduction
and forbearance to reduce the potential
for shortages.
A companion set of long-term
measures included the following:
Limit the volume of bypass flow
from Wellton-Mohawk through
advanced water conservation
practices;
Continue short-term measures such
as the shortage alleviation contin-
gency fund and the voluntary,
consumptive use and forbearance
program;
Continue water inflow to the
Cinega at quantity and quality
levels necessary to maintain, and
where possible, improve its value
as an ecological preserve; and
Treat excess Yuma-area groundwater
at YDP for use as M&I supply.
The U.S. Bureau of Reclamations
Lower Colorado
Region held public
meetings in October
in Phoenix and Yuma
to collect informationon potential methods
to recover or replace agricultural return
flows from Wellton-Mohawk. Operation
of the YDP is one option being consid-
ered, but Reclamation has set no
timetable for making a decision or
issuing a proposal.
Robert Snow, an attorney for the
Interior Department, said the YDP
workgroup provided an important
adjunct to the diplomacy and ongoing
binational discussions of water issues.
The bedrock of the relationship is the1944 treaty, but Snow said that does not
preclude other collaborations. I think
there are solutions coming from within
Mexico. I think America can be a
partner for that, with the Basin states,
with the knowledge of the stakeholders
in the [Colorado] Basin, he said.
Hinojosas group, Pronatura, is
spearheading an initiative to restore
the delta region in collaboration with
organizations on both sides of the
border, local communities and some
Mexican government agencies. Theinitiatives primary goal is restoration of
the delta ecosystem not to some pristine
past condition, but to what is possible
within existing development in the
Mexicali Valley and the limitations of
the existing flood-
plain, he said.
To achieve that
goal, Hinojosa said
legal protection forwetlands needs to be
expanded beyond the existing Biosphere
Reserve. A water program needs to be
created to get water to the wetlands,
but it must be a program that includes
participatory management by local
communities and government agencies,
he said.
We are creating a water trust in
Mexico to acquire water rights within
the Mexicali Valley and dedicate them
for the environment to maintain a
perennial base flow, all with Mexicanwater and within Mexican institutions,
Hinojosa said. But the long-term health
of the riparian system will also require
some kind of binational agreement on
pulse flows, he said.
All-American Canal CaseA border issue that seems to encapsu-
late many of the concerns about water
and the environment is the litigation
filed over the lining of the All-American
Canal, located in California just north
of the U.S.-Mexico border. Authorizedby Congress in 1988, the lining project
has been stalled not only by funding
problems, but also by concerns raised
by the Mexican government.
The project entails constructing a
It is a case that has
tremendous implications in
terms of the relationships
between our countries and
how we manage water.
Malissa Hathaway McKeith
Institutions Working onU.S.-Mexico W ater Issues
An alphabet soup of institutions is at work on border water issues, chief
among them the binational International Boundary and Water Commission(IBWC), which administers the 1944 water treaty between the U.S. and Mexico.
Other unilateral institutions include the North American Development Bank
(NADB) and the Border Environmental Cooperation Commission (BECC), the
U.S. Interior and State departments, EPA and its Mexican counterpart,
Secretaria de Medio Ambiente y Recursos Naturales (SEMARNAT). The
Comisin Nacional del Agua (CNA), Mexicos National Water Commission, is a
division of SEMARNAT with state offices in Baja California and Sonora that
manages Mexicos water supply. A host of NGOs also are actively involved on
both sides of the border.
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parallel lined canal section adjacent to
23 miles of existing unlined canal and
would conserve an estimated 67,700
acre-feet of water annually that now
seeps out of the canal and flows a short
distance underground across the border,
where it helps recharge the Mexicali
Valley aquifer in Mexico, a key source
of domestic and irrigation water there.
The lining project was part of thecomplicated QSA, counted on to help
California live within its 4.4 million
acre-feet per year allocation of Colorado
River water.
In addition to causing some bina-
tional tension, the lining project is now
the subject of a lawsuit filed in July on
behalf of the Economic Development
Council of Mexicali (CDEM) and two
U.S. environmental groups, Citizens
United for Resources and the Environ-
ment and Desert Communities Against
Pollution.
Malissa Hathaway McKeith, an
attorney with Lewis, Brisbois, Bisgaard
& Smith, who represents CDEM and
the two groups, said the lawsuit raises
two basic issues (1) alleged failure to
update a 1994 environmental impact
statement for the canal-lining project
and (2) claims that rights to use ground-
water in the Mexicali Valley predated the
Colorado River Compact of 1922 or
the subsequent 1944 U.S.-Mexico water
treaty, and were not changed by those
agreements. CDEM takes the position
that water drawn from the Mexicali
aquifer is not treaty water, as does the
Mexican Section of the IBWC, she said.
Everyone acknowledges the impor-
tance of the case for binational relations,
but opinions differ on whether litigationis the appropriate way to address the
lining dispute. It is a case that has
tremendous implications in terms of the
relationships between our countries and
how we manage water, McKeith said.
She said litigation was a last resort, a
step taken only when it appeared that
the pouring of concrete was inevitable.
The litigation wants to stop the
[lining] project, said Hentschke, who
characterized the suit as a Johnny-
come-lately effort to block a project
that was first authorized by legislation
in 1988, later adopted by the Bureau
of Reclamation in a record of decision
in 1994. Its also a case of trying to
establish a water right where one doesnt
exist, he said, referring to the claim
concerning rights to use to groundwater.
Snow agreed it is a tremendously
important case, one that implicates not
only U.S. environmental laws, but also
binational relations between the U.S.
and Mexico. In the past year, President
Bush has discussed the lining project
with Mexican President Vicente Fox,
and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
has discussed it with the Mexican
foreign minister, Snow said. While the
nature of those discussions has not been
made public, Snow said the best hope
for resolving any dispute over the All-American Canal lining project lies in
continued diplomacy through the IBWC
and through continued discussions
between U.S. leaders and their Mexican
counterparts.
The case was filed in the U.S.
District Court for the District of
Nevada. Hearings were scheduled for
October and January, though as this
article went to press, the October
hearing had not yet been held. In the
meantime, attorneys for CDEM and
the other plaintiffs are expected to file
a motion for a preliminary injunction
to block any construction on the lining
project until the court resolves the legal
issues.
Shortage GuidelinesThe development of Lower Basin
shortage guidelines and coordinated
management strategies for Lake Powell
Morelos Dam in Mexico diverts water to the Mexicali Valley.
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Continued on page 11
January12-13 Water and the West Meeting Supply Challenges Today and Beyond,
sponsored by The Center for the New West, Las Vegas, NV
web: http://www.centerfornewwest.org/water.xml
26-27 Colorado Water Congress Annual Convention. Denver, CO.Contact: Richard D. MacRavey, 303-837-0812, www.cowatercongress.org
February17-20 9th Annual Salton Sea International Bird Festival, Imperial, CA
Contact 760-344-5359 email: [email protected]: http://newriverwetlands.com/saltonsea.html
20-21 Water: Lifeline in the Desert, sponsored by Nevada Water ResourcesAssociation, Mesquite, N V Contact: 775-626-6389web: http:// www.nvwra.org/news.asp
March6-7 Colorado Water Law, Denver, CO
Contact: CLE International, 800-873-7130, www.cle.com
9-11 Xeriscape Conference and Expo, sponsored by Xeriscape Council ofNew Mexico, Inc., Albuquerque, NMContact: Scott Varner, 505-468-1021 email: [email protected]: www.xeriscapenm.com
23-24 Water Education Foundation 23 rd Annual Executive Briefing,Sacramento, CA Contact Diana Farmer, 916-444-6240, email:[email protected] web: www.watereducation.org
April5-7 Water Education Foundation Lower Colorado River Tour, Las Vegas, NV
Contact: Diana Farmer, 916-444-6240 email: [email protected]
web: www.watereducation.org
26-28 Water Education Foundation Central Valley Tour, Sacramento, CAContact: Diana Farmer, 916-444-6240 email: [email protected]: www.watereducation.org
27-28 Wyoming Water Law, Cheyenne WYContact CLE International, 800-873-7130, web:www.cle.com
May15-16 10th Annual Water Reuse Research Conference, sponsored by WateReuse
Foundation, Phoenix, AZ Contact: 703-684-2481web: ht tp:// watereuse.org/Foundation/ 2006conf/index.html
June14-16 Water Education Foundation Bay-Delta Tour, Sacramento, CA
Contact: Diana Farmer, 916-444-6240, email: [email protected]: www.watereducation.org
20-21 Annual Statewide Water Conference, sponsored by Arizona WaterResources Research Center, Phoenix, AZContact: Cas Sprout, 520-792-9591 ext. 55 email: [email protected]
Contact Sue McClurg with your calendar items from July 2005 through
December 2005 for inclusion in the Summer 2006 issue ofRiver Report,
[email protected] or 717 K Street, Suite 317, Sacramento, CA 95814
and Lake Mead under low reservoir
conditions to manage the river in the
U.S. during drought periods is a third
potential binational water concern. No
formal proposal for the guidelines hasbeen issued yet, but Reclamation held a
series of hearings in early November to
gather input from stakeholders. Shortage
guidelines could follow the format of
the interim surplus criteria, but they
would address management of the
reservoir system during dry conditions.
The issue is particularly acute for
Colorado River basin states that have
endured a record, five-year drought.
The water year that ended September
30, 2005, was slightly above average,
but the two main storage reservoirs,Lake Mead and Lake Powell, are only
about 55 percent full, leaving the system
very vulnerable should the coming water
year be a dry one.
Shortage guidelines would establish
some operational rules to be followed in
the Lower Basin in water-short condi-
tions, but they would raise complex
questions about how a shortage declara-
tion might affect Mexico. Would a
shortage declaration in the three Lower
Basin states of Arizona, California and
Nevada trigger language in the 1944U.S.-Mexico treaty compelling Mexico
to share in that shortage by taking less
than its 1.5 million acre-feet of water
in a water-short year? Could extremely
dry conditions in the Upper Basin
similarly trigger the treaty provision?
How shortage guidelines would be
implemented within the context of the
1922 Compact and the 1944 Treaty
remains unclear.
Shortage guidelines are scheduled
to be completed by December 2007
under a t imetable announced in May
2005 by Interior Secretary Gale Norton.
W hats Ahead?Mexico and the U.S. have a
longstanding relationship on water
issues, and have created a binational
agency, the IBWC, to address them.
How will stakeholders and those
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10/1210 COLORADO RIVER PROJECT RIVER REPORT WINTER 2005-2006
F R O M T H E H E A D L I N E S
would go to settle a water rights dispute
with the San Luis Rey Indian Tribes in
the San Diego area. The lawsuit alleges
that the lining project requires an
updated environmental impact state-ment and that it would infringe on
Mexican rights to pump groundwater
that seeps from the unlined canal and
recharges the Mexicali aquifer. IID,
SDCWA and the U.S. Department
of the Interior are opposing the suit.
Malissa Hathaway McKeith, attorney
for CDEM and the environmental
groups called it a myth that the All-
American Canal lawsuit would under-
mine the QSA or the Interim Surplus
Guidelines. But Dan Hentschke, general
counsel for SDCWA, said the water tobe conserved by the lining project is a
key part of San Diegos water reliability
program for the future, as is its water
transfer agreement with IID.
But IID lately is showing signs of
concern over water transfers. In a
resolution adopted in early November,
the districts board said IID wont
approve any additional water transfer
agreements and intends to move away
from fallowing as a means of developing
conserved water for future transfers.
And IID and SDCWA are involved in
an ongoing dispute over whether water
transferred so far under their agreement
has caused economic harm to the
Imperial Valley.
Under the IID-SDCWA agreement,
IID will transfer up to 200,000 acre-feet
of water per year to SDCWA for 45
years with an option to renew the
agreement for another 30 years. The full
Just two years after some of Californias
biggest water interests agreed to the
Quantification Settlement Agreement
(QSA), legal challenges and other forces
are chipping away at the QSAs foundations.While observers dont see serious
problems for the agreement yet, they say
there is cause for concern. Two lawsuits
that involve the QSA are pending in the
courts, and two big parties to the QSA
Imperial Irrigation District (IID) and
San Diego County Water Authority
(SDCWA) are dueling over the
socioeconomic effects of a long-term
water transfer from IID to SDCWA.
One lawsuit has two parts, a claim by
Imperial County that provisions of the
QSA to mitigate socioeconomic impactsviolate the Water Code and the Califor-
nia Environmental Quality Act (CEQA),
and a second part in which a group of
IID farmers claims the IID board of
directors illegally authorized the water
transfer to San Diego without approval
of the districts membership. No
substantive ruling has been issued in
the case, and a state appeals court earlier
this year put the case on hold.
Meanwhile, in Nevada federal court,
a Mexican business and civic group,
Economic Development Council of
Mexicali (CDEM), and two U.S.
environmental groups has sued, chal-
lenging a piece of the QSA that calls for
building a 23-mile parallel section of the
All-American Canal that would be lined
to reduce seepage. Some of the water
conserved by lining, 77,000 acre-feet per
year, would be transferred to SDCWA,
and about 16,000 acre-feet per year
Legal Actions, Disputes Cloud QSA Transfer
200,000 acre-feet per year rate wont be
reached until 2021, but by then water
from the IID transfer and the canal-
lining project are expected to account
for 30 percent of San Diegos watersupply. This year, 30,000 acre-feet of
water is expected to be transferred from
IID to San Diego.
Under the QSA, SDCWA was to pay
$10 million during the first four years
of the agreement to mitigate socioeco-
nomic impacts of land fallowing on the
Imperial Valley. John Liarakos, a
spokesman for SDCWA, said the first $2
million has been paid. A panel of three
economists determined in a December
2004 report that SDCWAs payments for
transferred water more than offset actualimpacts. IID directors disagree with that
finding, and the dispute was referred to
an administrative committee made up of
representatives from IID and SDCWA,
Liarakos said. The committees report
was due Nov. 18. If the administrative
committee is unable to reach accord, the
impacts question would go to another
committee that includes agency board
members, and if that panel is unable to
reach agreement, issues would be
submitted to arbitration.
The litigation, and the dispute
between IID and SDCWA, are all signs
that bear watching for the future of
the QSA, said Antonio Rossman, an
attorney who represents Imperial
County. Imperial County has been a
cautious supporter of the QSA, he said,
but he noted there is growing sentiment
within the county questioning whether
to continue with it.
By Glenn Totten
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8/3/2019 Winter 2005 River Report, Colorado River Project
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WINTER 2005-2006 RIVER REPORT COLORADO RIVER PROJECT 11
institutions respond to water shortages
and environmental preservation needsin a time of increasing competition for
water for food production and munici-
pal and industrial use? Developments
like the YDP recommendations and
private initiatives on both sides of the
border give reason for optimism, but
strong binational commitments will
be needed to fulfill their promise.
Most of the environmental values
in the Colorado system, such as the
Cinega de Santa Clara, are currently
supported by system inefficiencies, Culp
noted. As the belts tighten on waterresource management, as we try to put
more people onto the same pie, theres
a real risk that those resources are going
to be lost, he warned.
The risks of not finding solutions
could have powerful regional repercus-
sions, said McKeith. Depleting the
Mexicali aquifer by lining the All-
American Canal could have serious
economic and social consequences for
both countries, she warned. Were
talking about really big impacts to the
agricultural community of the MexicaliValley, which supports a lot of
farmworkers who otherwise would
be coming across the border looking
for work, she said.
But there is disagreement on the
institutional framework within which
border water issues can be resolved.
Some believe the best approach lies in
using existing relationships such as the
IBWC, but others question whether
diplomatic institutions can act quickly
enough or include all stakeholder
interests. What roles will litigation or
private relationships play?
The reality is that . . . our institu-
tions dont seem to serve us all that well
as far as creating partnerships, helping
[the U.S. and Mexico] bond together,
said Frahm.
Snow is a believer that litigation can
be avoided and that existing institutional
arrangements between the U.S. and
Continued from page 9
F E A T U R E A R T I C L E Mexico can address and resolve bina-
tional water issues. What I think is
inevitable is that there will be greater
and continuing regional partnerships
across the border. The dialogue betweenthe U.S. and Mexico with respect to the
Colorado River will always have to work
through the treaty mechanisms [that]
have been established between our two
countries because the way governments
bond is through their formal structures,
he said.
Culp said interests on both sides of
the border may need to change the way
they look at border issues. If we want
to avoid a future of conflict, I think we
need to frame the issues, particularly
binational issues, in a broader contextthat will allow us to avoid zero-sum
outcomes with regard to water manage-
ment. There are interests on both sides
of the border that can be served through
a collaborative approach to river
management, he said. But if that
approach is to be successful, stakeholders
must commit to follow through on
reaching solutions, he said.
The Rio Hardy is an important tributary
in the Colorado Rivers delta region.
But McKeith said litigation some-
times is necessary to get the attention
of parties focused on a problem theyve
been ignoring. The fact that litigation
has been filed does not preclude peoplefrom actually sitting down and looking
at the physical alternatives to the [All-
American Canal] lining that, in fact,
might reduce the economic and environ-
mental impacts on the Mexican side,
she said.
Hentschke thinks litigation is a poor
way to resolve border issues like the
All-American Canal. In litigation, you
have winners and losers, he noted.
Litigation wont end the need for a
diplomatic solution to the canal-lining
dispute, he predicted.Culp thinks the five-year drought on
the Colorado River system that began in
2000 may be just a preview of the condi-
tions that could be routine for Colorado
River managers and stakeholders in 20
to 25 years. If so, that will increase com-
petition among users as well as pressure to
find creative solutions to manage the
resource for all its many users.
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8/3/2019 Winter 2005 River Report, Colorado River Project
12/12
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